


Neal Drones On and On

by My_Alter_Ego



Series: White Collar Discussions [5]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Examination of Motives, Gen, Pre-Series Fiction, Weapons of Mass Destruction, attempted theft, gunshot wound, taking a leap of faith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-29
Updated: 2019-09-29
Packaged: 2020-11-01 11:37:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20814512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/My_Alter_Ego/pseuds/My_Alter_Ego
Summary: This is a pre-series story that unfolds after Neal is temporarily taken into custody by the Virginia police. Peter finds out only after a wounded Neal has escaped and is now on the run. Peter can’t help but worry about his elusive quarry, and hopes that Neal will contact him before things go from bad to worse.





	Neal Drones On and On

Peter was sitting in his New York White Collar office perusing files that were less than scintillating—more or less a mixture of fraud and racketeering without the flash and dazzle of a daring art heist. Although he would never admit it to anyone, Peter missed being challenged, and perhaps taunted, by a very special thief and con man. Neal Caffrey had been quiescent on the home front, and Peter suspected he may have found a new niche in Europe. Was it wrong to be hopeful that the cheeky young robber would again initiate his criminal enterprises on his native shores? There is an old saying, _“Be careful what you wish for,” _and perhaps that was good advice. When Peter listened to his phone messages after lunch later in the day, the fulfillment of his wish was profoundly upsetting.

A voice with a slow Southern drawl had left a short, succinct message. It had come in from the Virginia State Police informing him that Neal Caffrey had been located near the seaport town of Newport News. Actually, the fugitive sought by the FBI had been arrested after an emergency room physician had treated him for a shoulder wound that looked suspiciously like it had been the result of a bullet. The patient had claimed that it was a freak accident caused by a piece of rebar, but, by law, physicians have to report their misgivings. Caffrey had provided a bogus name, but the police didn’t know that at the time. To cover their bases, they had detained him in a local holding cell until they could run his fingerprints through AFIS. By the time they got the shock of their life to discover they had one of the stars on the FBI’s most wanted list, Caffrey was in the wind.

Eventually, Peter was able to track down the arresting officer and speak with him. “How bad was the gunshot wound?” was Peter’s first question.

“The ER doc claimed it was a through and through and didn’t hit anything vital,” the officer replied tiredly. “It certainly didn’t hamper his ability to slip his handcuffs and pick the lock on his cell. Damn if I know where he got any implement to perform that feat. We searched him pretty thoroughly before we caged him.”

Peter suspected that Neal had hidden pieces of thin metal wire sewn into the seams of his clothes that had come in handy when he found himself in a tough spot. Caffrey was always prepared for any eventuality. The FBI agent chose not to relate this to the Virginia cop. The guy was already embarrassed enough, so why belabor a point? Before Peter ended the conversation, he was intrigued by the officer’s final comment.

“Ya know, it’s really weird—I mean, you calling me and all,” the Virginia policeman added slowly. “Your loose criminal actually kept harping on us to contact Peter Burke at the White Collar Office of the New York City division of the FBI. He made it sound like it was a matter of national security. We just blew him off ‘cause a lot of arrested perps brag about having an ‘in’ with law enforcement. So, do you really know him?”

“Yeah, I do,” Peter admitted. “Actually, we go back quite a ways. I’ve been chasing him for three years.”

“Well, sorry we couldn’t hand him to you on a silver platter,” was the final comment in the conversation.

Peter hung up and contemplated this new development. He suddenly found himself very worried about Neal. Even though the cop had said that the wound was non-life threatening, there was always the possibility of infection if a criminal on the run didn’t take the proper precautions like sterile dressing changes and antibiotics. To say that Peter was emotionally involved with his young, elusive fugitive would have been an understatement.

A concerned FBI agent took out all the paperwork the Bureau had amassed on Neal, and tried to get some insight into where he might go if he was injured. Did he have a safe house where he could convalesce or where someone could look after him until he was back on his feet? Peter was coming up empty four hours later when he finally shoved everything into a briefcase and made his way home. El was overseeing a wedding in the Catskills and would be staying overnight in the Adirondack resort, so dinner that night was a large pepperoni pizza delivered from the neighborhood trattoria. While eating, Peter went over every detail in the files once again, and when he finally was still coming up empty-handed, he let Satchmo out into the back yard and climbed the stairs to take a shower. A half hour later he returned in a robe and was suddenly brought up short as he found himself staring at Neal Caffrey holding Peter’s service revolver.

“Hello, Neal,” Peter said cautiously.

“Peter,” the fugitive acknowledged.

“I was under the impression that you didn’t like guns,” a wary agent said quietly.

“Maybe you were misinformed,” the young man answered smugly, “or perhaps desperate times make for desperate measures. Now, it’s very imperative that we have a little discussion,” Neal added as he tossed Peter’s handcuffs onto the couch. “Take a seat, slow and easy, and put those on.”

Peter did as he was told and then stared curiously at his nemesis. This was the first time that he had actually experienced an up close and personal encounter with the con man, if you didn’t include that brief passing interaction outside of a bank when Peter had initially relegated him to the category of a concerned investor. The Neal that was now seated across from him in a wingback chair seemed younger than he remembered. He was still devilishly handsome, but tonight his face had a pale, drawn sort of look and Peter noticed that he kept his left arm close to his side. Even though Neal was the one holding a gun, the wounded fugitive looked vulnerable to Peter.

“How’s the shoulder?” Peter asked in concern.

“Healing nicely, thank you, not that you really care,” Neal answered flippantly.

“Now why would you think that I don’t care?” Peter asked conversationally, although he really did want to know.

“Because you never came when I reached out to you,” Neal snorted in contempt. “You once said that all I had to do was call if I was in a jam and you would come. You never came, Peter, so I guess that was all lip service to make me think I could trust you.”

“Trust is a two-way street, Neal. It has to be earned. How can you possibly expect me to trust you while you’re holding a gun on me?” Peter quipped.

“Fine!” Neal retorted as he tossed the firearm onto the couch beside Peter. “Now don’t get all macho and try to shoot me. I took the precaution of removing the clip as well as the bullet in the chamber. Unless you think you can brain me with an empty gun, just sit still and listen.”

“Okay, I’ll listen, but there’s one thing that you should know, up front, before we get started,” Peter stated emphatically. “I had no idea that you had been arrested down in Virginia. I only heard about it after you had escaped. I would have come to get you, Neal, whether you believe that’s true or not.”

Neal cocked his head and was silent for a few minutes. “This doesn’t change anything. I still don’t trust you.”

“Likewise,” Peter acknowledged. “Nevertheless, why this sudden drop-in visit?”

“Because there is something you need to know which could impact us all,” Neal answered carefully.

“Okay, I’m all ears simply because I find myself to be a captive audience,” Peter said as he relaxed back onto the sofa cushions.

“Funny man,” Neal answered drolly. “I’m going to tell you a hypothetical story, so don’t think I’m confessing or anything.”

“Of course not,” Peter snarked. “By all means, tell me a bedtime fairy tale, but make it good.”

“Okay, let’s start with once upon a time there was a very clever and talented entrepreneur,” Neal said as he played the game. “Now this artistically-inspired person may have heard chatter that some valuable Italian artwork was being shipped Stateside on its way to a southern museum. It was locked in a storage container aboard a freighter set to make landfall in Newport News, Virginia. The dedicated art aficionado may have actually been given the number of that very container located among a sea of others. However, there was a slight glitch. Perhaps the intel was faulty or the provider of the information was dyslexic and reversed some digits. To make a long story short, the night that the ship docked, our intrepid hero discovers that the number for the shipping container was inaccurate—like big time. The interested party accessed what he thought was the proper container, but instead of Italian masters, he found something lethal and deadly.”

“What did this stalwart Indiana Jones happen to find?” Peter asked facetiously.

“WMDs” Neal answered succinctly.

“Care to be a bit more specific,” Peter urged, although he found himself intrigued.

“Well, let’s just say that the adventuresome explorer found that the entire container was stacked, floor to ceiling, with drones embossed with Cyrillic lettering on them. Since when does the United States import armaments like military-grade drones from a political adversary? It makes no sense unless there’s a domestic rogue faction quietly amassing their own arsenal of war toys from Russia.”

When Neal saw that he had captured his hostage’s attention, he continued quite seriously. “Peter, picture swarms of undersea, surface, and aerial drones hunting submarines hidden in the vastness of the ocean or darting through New York City seeking out targets and showering them with a deadly nerve agent. With the emerging technology, one of those things could probably deliver a small dirty bomb to coordinates on a computer located miles away. It’s pretty damn scary, if you ask me.”

“Neal, are you sure of your facts?” Peter demanded to know.

The young con man insisted on keeping up the hypothetical façade. “I know what Indiana Jones saw, and unfortunately, some other dangerous people on board also realized what he saw. They tried to kill him when he made a rather harried departure,” Neal informed Peter.

“So, that’s when you took a bullet,” Peter said softly.

“As you can probably imagine, the protagonist of this fictional tale may have been temporarily compromised, but he was cunning and survived to fight another day,” Neal said softly. “He was hoping that at least one person would believe his story and take the threat seriously, maybe move it up the food chain to some agency like Homeland Security.”

“Neal, stop referring to yourself in the third person,” Peter said, almost fondly. “Are you sure that shoulder wound you sustained is really healing?”

“Peter, can you just focus on the big picture and stop channeling a mother hen?” the con man pleaded. “I may spend a lot of time abroad, but I love my country and wouldn’t want to see parts of it decimated, or innocent people dropping like flies because of some foreign ideology that desires to rule the world. That’s just outside the scope of my imagination.”

Peter was thoughtful. “If I did approach another agency like Homeland, I would need some very solid evidence to get them to agree to the search and seizure of a foreign vessel anchored in one of our ports,” he explained. “Even though you were in the midst of committing a crime, are you willing to come forward with the knowledge of what you witnessed?” Peter asked hopefully. “Maybe, if your tip pans out, I could finagle a deal to get the charges against you dropped.”

“Crime, what crime?” Neal asked with his eyebrows raised. “I never stole anything from that freighter.”

“Only because you got your wires crossed and didn’t find the art you wanted to steal,” Peter harrumphed. “Not to mention that people were shooting at you, so that cut into your time to search for it. To make an impact, we need a solid witness like you willing to come forward.”

“That’s a disappointing answer, Peter, and I had loftier expectations of you,” Neal remarked sadly.

Peter sighed. “Look, Buddy, if you won’t step up to the plate, all I can do is check the ship’s manifest to see who intends to claim the contents of that particular container. I can look into them as well the customs inspector who gave it a thumb up. He may be on someone’s payroll.”

Neal huffed out a breath. “With all those federal ‘good guy’ rules in place, it sort of hamstrings the heroes of the story.”

“Neal, there has to be rules or everything just becomes chaos.”

The con man had his own opinion. “Well, I don’t like rules so I break them. That makes me a bad guy in your world, but I can deal with that. But I really, really hate spy games and espionage scenarios. They’re ugly, evil, and diabolical, and innocent people get hurt.”

“I agree wholeheartedly,” Peter answered. “Just give me a good old-fashioned slick art theft any day of the week.”

“I could certainly do my best,” Neal snickered. “While I was waiting for you to come downstairs, I couldn’t help but notice that you were doing a little light reading about me. Does reliving my alleged exploits give you a thrill, Peter?”

“No, Neal, it gives me a headache and makes me worry,” Peter said honestly.

Neal just offered a lopsided grin. “Well, I guess I accomplished what I came to do, so maybe it’s time for me to go. No use droning on and on about what you can’t fix. How’s that for a horrible pun?”

“I could fix you, if you’d let me,” Peter said softly as he watched Neal stand up slowly while tensing his shoulder. “I think you just need a firm hand wielded by someone who really cares about your welfare. I suspect somewhere in your upbringing the personal touch was lacking and nobody pointed you towards true north. Let me be the one to save you from yourself, Neal.”

“Maybe I don’t consider myself to be broken or in need of fixing,” the young man challenged.

“But you seem to have a driving need to put yourself in danger, and that certainly isn’t either mentally or physically healthy,” Peter countered. “What are you trying to prove, kiddo, and why do you need to prove it?”

“Now you’re the one droning on and on,” Neal replied irritably. “Don’t try and psychoanalyze me, Peter. My head is a dark labyrinth of serpentine tunnels where you could get totally lost. Instead, why don’t you just try to solve a more tangible problem. Try to figure a way out of those handcuffs. I’ll give you a little clue where the key might be. I found a 25-pound bag of canine kibble in the pantry. Maybe that elusive little item may have fallen to the bottom. Have fun!”

Peter actually had a spare handcuff key in a kitchen drawer, so there was no need for him to dump dog food all over the floor after Neal silently departed. A contemplative man sat down to compose his thoughts, and had no doubts that Neal had been telling him the truth about an illegal shipment of dangerous foreign arms landing on American soil. Peter would definitely kick that bit of troubling intel up the food chain. He had also learned something else intriguing that evening. He had discovered that a narcissist who the profilers claimed was a sociopath was actually a patriot worried about his country. Somehow, that made Neal endearing in a screwed up sort of way. This whole relationship between a cop and a criminal was probably screwed up as well, and perhaps Peter should reexamine his motives to take Neal down. It could prove to be dangerous for both of them in so many ways that didn’t have anything to do with WMDs.


End file.
